So check the gut on Irv Eatman. The Houston Oiler offensivetackle weighs 310 pounds, and his very name confesses, "I.Eatman." To which we can only reply: You certainly do, man.

But that's cool. Fat's cool. And cool, in hip-hop slang, isphat. Thus: Fat is phat. "Fat on fat" is how 330-pound Nate (theKitchen) Newton, the Dallas Cowboy guard, describes blocking335-pound William (the Refrigerator) Perry, who spent the lasttwo seasons as a tackle with the Philadelphia Eagles. "If we rubup against each other the wrong way, we'll start a grease fire."

I'm a Lincoln. Offensive tackle Lincoln Kennedy of the AtlantaFalcons will begin the season at 350 pounds, an entire Olympicgymnast less than his off-season high of 415. When ArizonaCardinal offensive tackle Larry Tharpe was with the DetroitLions, he was known as Magnum because, says then teammate LomasBrown, "He weighed 357." Cleveland Brown offensive tackleOrlando (Zeus) Brown stands 6'6", weighs 325, wears a size-64suit coat and declined to be interviewed for this story bycasting verbal lightning bolts at his inquisitor. "You think I'msome kind of ---- freak?" loosed Zeus.

And so we celebrate sport's newest roll models, footballplayers the size of the federal budget deficit, several of whomwe gathered for a (very) round-table discussion of sumowrestling, suit shopping and the relative shortcomings of wickerfurniture. We asked all kinds of impertinent questions of these300-pounders. They graciously gave us their gut reactions.

Only Newton uses the F word. "Fat helped me get into thisleague," reasons the two-time Pro Bowl starter. "And it gets meattention. It's all you guys write about: fat, fat, fat. Somepeople think I'm so fat that they have to see it for themselves.So they hire me for a personal appearance and pay me lots ofmoney so they can see how fat I am."

In other words: No gut, no glory.

In the beginning, there was but one Monster of the Midriff. Les(Bingo) Bingaman played defensive tackle for Detroit from 1948to '54, when men were men and personal scales were like bowlingscores: They stopped at 300. But a grain scale in a Michiganfeed store registered Bingo at 350 pounds, which seems aboutright when you consider that a pilot once asked him to move fromthe rear of the plane to the front to facilitate takeoff.

The writer Kingsley Amis has noted that outside every fat man isan even fatter man trying to close in. But in the three decadesthat followed Bingaman's retirement, fewer than two dozen300-pound men made it into the NFL. They were rare specimenslike Sherman Plunkett, a 330-pound offensive tackle for theBaltimore Colts, the New York Jets and the San Diego Chargersfrom 1956 to '67. Plunkett's Colt roommate awoke one night tofind the Sherman tank snuffling in a five-pound tube ofliverwurst in the darkness.

Plunkett notwithstanding, in those days the round one was morelikely to play on the defensive rather than the offensive line.As late as 1986 only two 300-pound offensive linemen were takenin the entire NFL draft. Compare that to the five 300-poundoffensive linemen taken in the first 31 selections of thisyear's draft--including the second pick overall (by theJacksonville Jaguars), tackle Tony Boselli, flab-free at 325pounds.

This seismic shift from one side of the scrimmage line to theother is simply the result of a cyclical tipping of the balanceof power in the NFL. "It's evolution," says Joe Woolley,assistant general manager of the Arizona Cardinals. "All of asudden these big guys were overpowering the offensive linemen.It's like the time the league went through a series of smallwide receivers to get past big cornerbacks. Teams startedgetting small corners. Now there are big wide receivers, andyou'll see bigger cornerbacks."

Bigger is better, in all areas.

Football's most bighearted big man was Big House, 350-pound NewEngland Patriot offensive lineman Steve Moore. In 1987 he wasbundled off to Duke University's renowned eating-disorderclinic, where in six weeks of intensive therapy he gained 11pounds. When the Pats saw no less of Moore, his career wasfinished, more or less. Within a year of his release he waskilled by a robber. "He had absolutely no enemies," recallsPats' offensive tackle Bruce Armstrong. "The bigger he got, thenicer he was."

Why is it that those men most bound by gravity are leastburdened by gravitas? Call it the unbearable lightness of beingheavy, the big man's inability to take himself too seriously.What's instructive here is not that 300-pound center Jeff (Deli)Dellenbach of the Patriots can fit his wife and three childreninto his boxer shorts, but that he has. "Let's face facts," saysParker of the Bills. "There's not a lot of well-paying jobs for300-pounders. We found them, and we're happy about it."

"Big guys have to be jolly, as much crap as we take sometimes,"says the Saints' Cooper. "I wear a 15 shoe, and I go to storeshoping they have a 15. So you go over to the guy and kind ofwhisper, 'Do you have a 15?' And it never fails. The guy willgo, 'Hey, Johnny, do we have a 15?' Wheeewww!"

So why does Brad Hopkins get no jollies from Jolly St. Nick, orfrom the Jolly Green Giant, or from the stereotype of the jollyfat man gorging himself on Jolly Ranchers? "Jolly is bull----,"sneers the 306-pound Oiler offensive tackle. "A jolly guy is afat guy in a bar. Norm from Cheers is jolly. Norm couldn't be afootball player."

True. Make no mistake, the 300-pounder is an athlete. Last yearalone there were eight 300-pounders in the Pro Bowl. Among thegame's best linemen is Newton, who credits Perry for making fatphat. "He opened doors for people to realize that if you cut offa man's gut, the part that's hanging over his belt, there stillmight be a lot of football player behind it," says Newton.

And yet, in football, as with the movie-theater beverageindustry, there is no Too Big, no outer limit. Large enough towear muumuus, these men are lithe enough to wear tutus. Swann inSwan Lake? Don't laugh. "The most impressive thing I see is aguy who can be over 300 pounds and have the feet of aballerina," says 300-pound Jacksonville center Dave Widell.(Widell. Newton. Eatman. What is in a name?)

Is it too much to suggest that 300-pound linemen--graceful giantsengaged in ham-hand-to-hand combat--are America's answer to sumowrestlers? Dallas offensive line coach Hudson Houck must thinkso; he has screened sumo films for the members of hisnot-so-thin blue line, to demonstrate the advantages of gettingyour hands inside and staying low to maintain balance.

"I love it, really," says 315-pound Indianapolis Colt defensivetackle Tony Siragusa, when asked his opinion of sumo. "I thinkthose guys are sexy. I'd like to wear one of those thongsonstage and let people watch me."

Yet Swann demurs. "I think it's an insult to humankind," hesays. "For people to get that big, try to grab each other andthrow each other out of a ring? I think that's just absurd."

So does 315-pound guard Dwayne White of the St. Louis Rams. "Idon't like to see those big guys splashing each other," says theman whose nickname is...Road Grader.

It is impossible to say how many 300-pounders will be splashingeach other in the NFL this season, because the PlanetlikePerson so often lies about his weight. Thus, the Oilers listonly five 300-pounders on their roster. "But if you puteverybody in here on the scale right now," says 304-pound guardJohn Flannery, who spent the last four seasons with Houston, "Ibet you'd have at least a dozen 300-pound guys." Not to mentionone very crowded scale.

Many reasons are offered for this bevy of heavies in the NFL:Human evolution, sophisticated weight training, hyperactiveglands and simple birthright. (As 302-pound San Francisco 49erdefensive tackle Dana Stubblefield says, "I was big when I waslittle.") Some front-office types suggest that it's an opticalillusion, that the league's crackdown on steroid use hasresulted in sloppier, not heavier, men. But the two biggestreasons--the two all-beef patties of explanation, if you will--maywell be fast food and slow metabolism.

The Three Hundred Pounder. It is not yet a menu item atMcDonald's, but if it ever is, Newton will be sorely tested. "Iused to see a Burger King commercial and drive right to BurgerKing," he says. "I'd see a Popeye's commercial and drive for a12-piece bucket. I'm more careful now. I went through JennyCraig, NutriSystem, all of them. None of them got me off frenchfries. I looked into Overeaters Anonymous--but I didn't want toget hypnotized. I once thought about getting my jaw wired, butthen I figured I'd just take french fries and put them into theblender."

"There were times," says Parker, "especially in my rookie year,when it would be nothing for me to down a case of beer and acouple of large pizzas. And 50 chicken wings on top of that."

As it is imprudent to interrupt these guys when they are eating,so it is dangerous to stop them when they are talking abouteating. So hear out Widell. "I used to be able to eat quite abit," he says, modestly employing the past tense. "I'll tell youone little story.

"One of my high school buddies is named Steve Pinone. He's anassistant basketball coach at Villanova and played on the 1985Villanova national championship basketball team. We used to goto an all-you-can-eat buffet called Custy's, in Rhode Island. Wewent with Steve's older brother John Pinone, who played for theAtlanta Hawks. We called the restaurant and said, 'Hey, we'vegot four or five guys who can really do some eating.' This placeserved filet mignon and lobster. We said, 'We're going to comein there and try to set a record. We're going to try to beatAndre the Giant's record for eating there.' Which was, like, 12lobsters and 12 steaks. They said, 'Oh, don't worry about it.We're sure we'll be able to accommodate you.'

"We're all pretty big guys. The first thing we do is drink thewater in the glasses and go fill them with melted butter. Westart with the lobster tails. For a lobster to be an officialeat, you had to eat the tail and the large claw. Steve had whatwe like to call a triple-double at Custy's, meaning he ate 21lobsters, 12 filets mignons and five dozen assorted cocktailshrimp and baked stuffed shrimp. I had 18 or 19 lobsters and 11steaks. As we were dunking our lobster tails in our glassesfilled with butter, they finally stopped serving us lobster. Wesaid, 'We warned you.' It was all you can eat for $21. You eat acouple lobsters, and you're putting them under. They closed thatplace down about two months later."

No wonder, then, that when interior linemen talk interior decor,they dare not consider wicker. "Wicker," says Widell, "isn't agood choice for most offensive linemen." Indeed. After pancakinga patio chair at a Pier I Imports, Widell admits, he grabbed hiswife and "sort of slithered" from the store undetected, his rearend rattan-splintered like a Singapore graffiti artist's.

The Big Man, it seems, is always crushing things accidentally."I broke the seat of my truck," says Road Grader's 335-poundformer teammate, Jet offensive lineman James Brown, theGodfather of Soul Food. "I hit a bump and bent it all the wayback."

"I broke a barber's chair," one-ups Ray Brown, a 315-poundWashington Redskin guard. "I was trying to get a shave, and thechair snapped. I was probably a little heavy then, I mustadmit...."

And so on. It seems the Planetlike Person spends the better partof his summers violently buckling aluminum-framed lawn chairs.

"They make those things for 98-pounders," says Hopkins, whoselife is set to a soundtrack of shattering furniture. Eachblown-out chair is like a cymbal crash punctuating ridiculouscalliope music.

Crash! "I don't know how many times I've sat in a director'schair and just crumpled it," says Parker. "And those aluminumchairs? They just collapse."

And so forth. Each of these men is an awesome force of nature, aweather system unto himself, his path of destruction strewn withtwisted metal and fallen timber and the slack-jawed stares ofthe Non-Enormous. "I just happened to sit on the corner of thistable, thinking it was sturdy enough," recalls 340-poundCincinnati Bengal defensive tackle Keith Rucker, and you thinkyou know where he's going with this one. "And the leg just,like, crumbled. Everyone just stood there in amazement."

And yet, when it comes to man's ability to use his rear end as ahydraulic press, Cooper takes the (pan)cake. The tackle had justcompleted a tryout with the Jets in 1989 when he and four otherairbus-sized players sat down in the gate area at LaGuardiaairport to await a flight. Their five connected chairs--eachanchored to a single steel support beam--groaned and then snappedsimultaneously, like a five-seat dunk tank.

"We were laughing so hard we couldn't respond to the stewardesswho came over to see how we were," says Cooper. "Everybody waslaughing. Now that I know better, I should have yelled,'Whiplash!'"

And so they are comfortable speaking for one another. "We'd alllike to be built like gods," said 300-pound Derek Kennard, whoretired from the Cowboys this summer. "Look at Chad Hennings.We'd all like to be built like that. You dream about that. Youdream of being a little scatback. But...."

He considered his own frame.

"But my dream isn't coming soon to a theater near you."

In fact, Kennard spoke a canard. As a rule the Big Man does notdream of being lean. "No," says Dellenbach. "My dreams are a lotbetter than that."

"No," says Brown. "All my dreams are still big."

"I like being a big guy," says 330-pound nosetackle GilbertBrown of the Green Bay Packers. "I love being a big guy. That'sall I wanted to be, a big guy. I was always a big, short [6'2"],fat guy."

It's no small feat, the Big Man finding happiness in this smallworld. Slim dreams? Fat chance. Small minds? Big deal. The BigMan has faced bigotry big-time, but really, he's just like youand me. "Big guys are no different," Kennard said this summer,as a parting shot to his 10-year NFL career.

"Except," he added proudly, "we're big."

COLOR PHOTO: PHOTOGRAPH BY BILL FRAKES'Nuff Said What's in a name? In the case of 310-pound Oiler tackle Irv Eatman, a philosophy of life--and football (page 36). [back of Irv Eatman in football uniform - T of C]COLOR PHOTO: PHOTOGRAPHS BY BILL FRAKESIrv Eatman The 310-pound Oiler tackle may well be the most aptly named of the NFL's growing number of gigantic linemen.COLOR PHOTO: PHOTOGRAPHS BY BILL FRAKES Lincoln Kennedy Through sheer willpower, though not necessarily his own, the Falcon tackle shed more than 50 pounds in one off-season. [Lincoln Kennedy attempting to get food from child]COLOR PHOTO: PHOTOGRAPHS BY BILL FRAKES Nate Newton Unlike many of the large legion who eschew the word "fat," the Cowboy veteran has been dining out on his size for years. [Nate Newton surrounded by bags of chips and other food]COLOR PHOTO: PHOTOGRAPHS BY BILL FRAKESJeff Dellenbach The Patriot center's sons (from left), Dax, Dane and Dilon, and their mom, Mary, find Dad's trunks to be family-sized. [Dax Dellenbach, Dane Dellenbach, Dilon Dellenbach, Mary Dellenbach, and Jeff Dellenbach]COLOR PHOTO: JOHN BIEVERBob Dahl When protecting the passer, the Cleveland guard would admit, a perfect pancake block is always worth the weight.COLOR PHOTO: PETER READ MILLER Dwayne White There is no getting around it: Calling the Road Grader huge or enormous instead of just fat would really be a stretch.